The Rake Magazine

Tag: sex

  • Having "It," but not necessarily talking about "It"

    Note to "media types:" Your power by using sexual innuedno to get the "prized audience" isn’t working so well…anymore!

    I have been spending a lot of time lately doing research on what people read and why. There are a few important areas that seem to bug the future of this country and the ones who will ultimately be the ones to make or break the disastrous state of our economy.

    First of all, kids, for the most part, are honest about everything. They are informed, sometimes too much, and can smell a phony from miles away.

    I asked my "research group" to help me understand what drives them to the sources they use for information, besides what they learn in school. The conclusion of my study was not surprising to me personally, but may be to some of you "media types…"

    Let me begin with this: The people I have been doing research with are teenagers from ALL walks of life and from different socio-economic backgrounds.

    Without giving away too much of the valuable information that I have accumulated over the last several months, I will share with you this, a portion of what I heard: "Don’t think we can’t figure out when someone has to use SEX in a headline to get our attention. If the writer has real experience and wants our attention, then it will happen naturally because we are inundated with images of SEX all day long and are numb to it. Thanks to the Internet, cable TV, bad radio shows…etc…We don’t think that SEX is any big deal."

    This, to me, a 40-year-old woman who is not embarrassed to say that I still feel shy about sex, is sad and disturbing.The allure of those great things in life we call "Chemistry" and "Love" seems to have hit the skids. And the adults who are using the innocence of young people to take away one of the pleasures we look forward to in life are responsible. This admittedly including myself at times.

    Sex may sell to some, but after a lot of conversations with the young ones, the excitement of the unknown, the mystery of what makes you fall in love and experience sex are still right where they should be: in their hearts. They still want it to be experienced the old-fashioned way: through unconditional love, honesty, kindness, respect, compassion, and friendship. Not from a "media type" who clearly would not have to talk about something sacred if they were getting that something sacred at home.

    As I was told by my parents and try to convey to my own teenagers: If you have "it," enjoy "it," and appreciate "it." The ones who don’t have "it" are easy to spot; just go on your gut and your morals and you will know.

  • The 2008 Most Beautiful People at the Capitol Awards

    Photos by Denis Jeong

    Nearly two months ago, we embarked on a quest unprecedented in the history of Minnesota politics. Our pursuit — nay — our calling from a higher being, was to seek out the most beautiful, spectacular, and otherwise hot people who labor at the Capitol — in obscurity or otherwise. The response was overwhelming, with hundreds of comments and e-mails singling out the stunning men and women who turn the wheels of legislation.

    Of course, there were roadblocks, not least of which was the MN House of Representatives, according to several reports, "suggesting" that House members not participate in the contest in any way and a persistent error message popping up when House members tried to access the site. But through the ingenuity, perseverance, and profoundly inappropriate suggestions of outfits for winners to wear to their photo shoots by The Rake‘s editorial staff, we found a way to bring you, our readers the unbelievably sexy hotdish that is the 2008 Most Beautiful People at the Capitol awards.

    And because our readers made this possible, it’s up to you to pick the King and Queen of Minnesota politics. Take a moment to decide which one man and one woman in the photos below gives you that odd tingly feeling — whose smoldering stare leaps forth from the electronic page to make you shift uncomfortably in your seat. Once you’ve wiped the sweat from your brow, post a comment below to tell us your choices. We’ll be throwing a coronation party later this summer to announce the Alpha and Omega of Minnesotan political beauty and allowing you to marvel at their glory and majesty. A memory to treasure for a lifetime, to be sure.

    The Five Most Beautiful Women at the Capitol

    (Click images for full size.)

    LauraLaura Blubaugh
    Age: 26

    Hometown: Elmhurst, IL

    Party Affiliation: DFL

    One of the most stunning administrators in the history of the Senate Health, Housing, and Family Security Committee, Blubaugh arrived for her photo shoot intent on posing with a handwritten sign calling for universal healthcare. After some discussion, however, it was decided that the focus should be on her fabulously toned legs, rather than a controversial policy platform.

    Lest ye think she’s a simple policy wonk blessed from on high by a happy genetic accident, Blubaugh attacks her pastimes with the same zealotry she does equal access to healthcare for all. After work hours, she’s more often than not risking the aforementioned spectacular limbs boating through local white water in a kayak. And after emerging from the river like an adrenaline-fueled Aphrodite fresh from the foam, she finds time to take in plenty of live music, going out two or three times a week to take in anything from Greg Brown to Sigur Ros.

    RachelRachel Hicks

    Age: 23

    Hometown: Brooklyn Park, MN

    Party Affiliation: DFL

    Rachel Hicks, legislative assistant for Sen. Patricia Torres Ray, looks nothing like a former rugby player. She does, however, have the drive to advocate for immigration rights and feels an intense responsibility to help do something positive for the immigrant community. In the meantime, she does the rest of the metro area a favor by moonlighting as a beer tub girl on salsa nights at the Loring Pasta Bar.

    When not ministering to her adoringly thirsty congregation at the Loring, Hicks is an avid traveler — already making her mark on every continent save Antarctica and living in Argentina for a time. Through it all, she has stayed close to her family, especially, in a Skywalker-esque twist, her twin sister — whom she keeps close to her heart with a tattoo of a double helix DNA strand on her lower back. In fact, in high school at the ISEF-International Science and Engineering Fair, the twins took second place in the heated competition with an entry titled "Twins Two, It Takes Two: Phase Two".

    MelissaMelissa Reed

    Age: 29

    Hometown: Minneapolis

    Party Affiliation: Impressively non-partisan

    Leave it to the City of Minneapolis to employ a stunning, scooter-riding, world-traveling brunette with spectacular taste in liquor as a lobbyist.

    Melissa Reed, the stunning, scooter-riding, world-traveling brunette with spectacular taste in liquor in question, is uniquely qualified to argue for her hometown. She grew up on Lake Harriet and went gallivanting across the globe — from Italy to Morocco. She even lived in New Orleans as a civics, law and world history teacher for Teach for America only to return home as one of Minneapolis’ biggest boosters. And along the way she’s picked up that special something that turns heads in every room, despite being directed to dress like a proverbial nun for her photo shoot.

    Outside of her efforts at the Capitol to get the funding, programs and respect Minneapolis so richly deserves despite its reputation for hedonism and occasional depravity, Reed develops women’s health curriculum for religious organizations through a non-profit group and raises money to bring disadvantaged New Orleans kids to Minneapolis for seminars on political activism every year. That she accomplishes all this while engaged in a Sisyphean quest for the ultimate bacon cheeseburger and keeping her household well-stocked with high-end Scotch makes her all the more impressive.

    ReginaRegina Garza

    Age: 26

    Hometown: Roanoke, VA

    Political Affiliation: DFL

    Handpicked by former Sen. Jane Ranum to join her staff while working in D.C. as an advocate for labor and immigrant rights, the petite lady in red was brought here by the seductive, yet deceptive, song of Minnesota summers — learning too late that the rumors she heard about the state’s other seasons are all too true. She keeps herself warm by serving as Sen. Mee Moua’s Judiciary committee administrator, keeping a watchful eye on public safety and the courts while working unofficially on immigration policy initiatives for the senator.

    A self-described public policy wonk and political animal by nature, Garza still finds time to get away from the grasping tendrils of the legislative arena. Having met her fiancé, a competitive ballroom dancer, while salsa dancing, she continues to learn in the hopes of one day joining him in competition. She is also living proof of the Capitol’s effects on the mental state of all who work there – her tenuous grip on sanity causing her to run the Boston Marathon and planning to follow it up with the Twin Cities Marathon as well. But her drive and passion, combined with that little bit of crazy, makes for a striking package.

    MaryMary Lahammer

    Age: 34

    Hometown: St. Louis Park

    Political Affiliation: "None whatsoever"

    TPT’s politics reporter, program host and documentarian extraordinaire is generally known for her impartiality and political acumen, but there’s an extremely vocal subset of her audience watching for the disarming combination of her nigh-angelic good looks and choice of footwear that brings most mortal men to their knees. And despite being one of the most recognizable political journalists in the state, her career in public television has taken her far afield of the Capitol as well — from a pastoral week for a documentary on Isle Royal to a 17-course meal with Fidel Castro and Jesse Ventura.

    From her honeyed-blonde hair to her white leather high-heeled boots, Lahammer isn’t one to do things by halves — living an intense life away from Saint Paul’s hallowed legislative grounds as well. A recent foray into cliff-jumping in the Boundary Waters is only the latest example of her fervent desire to live what most would call an exhausting lifestyle. Training for the Olympic marathon trials and hauling 1,000 rolls of sod for an extreme landscaping project with her husband, who shared a 12 mile run with Lahammer on their first date, is seen as the norm in Minnesota’s first family of political journalism.

    And to make sure the next generation is prepared to take up arms for the cause, Lahammer’s daughter’s first words were, "More Capitol news mommy, please."

    The Five Most Beautiful Men at the Capitol

    (Click images for full size.)

    JuddJudd Schetnan
    Age: 35

    Hometown: Fergus Falls, MN

    Party Affiliation: "I work for the governor"

    Arguments about transit within the hallowed halls of the Capitol often get ugly, but the Met Council’s transit czar, Judd Schetnan, looks damn good after helping deliver a solid session for transit, despite threatened funding cuts for the Central Corridor — not to mention an angry GOP core out for blood after an overridden gubernatorial veto. And it’s obvious the Met Council’s transit lobbyist understands the heavy responsibility that comes with his runner’s physique, deep tan and somewhat roguish charm — looking to help lawmakers find ways to fit public transportation into an already strapped budget to help the entire state live up to its potential.

    Of course, now that the hard fought session is over, Schetnan is enjoying a well-deserved break. He spends as much time as possible lately with his wife and two sons, not to mention trips to his cabin just south of his hometown, as well as his boat on the St. Croix to work on deepening his tan – all the better to woo lawmakers in ’09 when the budget forecast is even more dismal than it was this year.

    NickNick Busse

    Age: 26

    Hometown: Jordan, MN
    Party Affiliation: decidedly non-partisan

    Busse, despite his obvious charm and good looks, was less than thrilled upon being the first nominee for this singular honor. However, after realizing the damage was already done, he decided to indulge his co-workers and allow himself to be enshrined as one of the hottest men to ever write for the Session Daily and Weekly.

    And despite this break to recognize his contributions to beautifying Saint Paul, this University of Minnesota graduate’s veins pulse in tune with the ebb and flow of legislation — even proposing to his wife at the Capitol. But let it not be said that Busse’s beauty is one-dimensional — when not furiously reporting on House activities, he runs Saintpaulitan.com, a blog devoted to showcasing the finer side of Saint Paul, and the occasional squirrel, to all those who fear to tread where legislators dwell.

    PeterPeter Brickwedde
    Age: 24

    Hometown: Minneapolis
    Party Affiliation: DFL

    As one of the men who keeps the State and Local Government Operations and Oversight committee functioning smoothly, one might imagine Sen. Ann Rest’s legislative assistant would be drunk on the heady nectar that is political power. However, this undeniably dreamy veteran of the Minnesota Senate is well-grounded, saying he’s working in one of the greatest environments he could ask for and demonstrating his modesty by downplaying the hordes of salivating colleagues who demanded his rightful place on the list of the state’s finest.

    When not wandering the halls of the Capitol, Brickwedde is a sports fanatic, contributing his journeyman labors to the Senate softball team and honing his already impressive Hebrew physique by playing tennis regularly. And when "The Brick" isn’t in action, he’s often enjoying some well-earned down time watching the Vikings, Twins, Wild, or sumo wrestling on "The Ocho."

    RonRon Latz

    Age: 44

    Hometown: Golden Valley, MN

    Political Affiliation: DFL

    The lone legislator in this roundup, Sen. Latz cuts a striking figure posing in the retail and housing complex he helped build at Excelsior and Grand as a St. Louis Park city councilmember. His work in the legislature is no less striking — having played a pivotal role this session in the 35W bridge collapse victim compensation bill. The majority whip from Senate District 44 has served in the MN Senate since 2006 and for four years before that in the MN House.

    The senator also maintains a thriving criminal and employment law practice and spends as much time as possible with his family, traveling from soccer game to soccer game watching his kids and waking up before dawn to maintain the what are, according to one anonymous commenter, the "impressive shoulders and steely jaw that draw jealous stares from his GOP colleagues."

    But Sen. Latz isn’t simply a masculine figure for St. Louis Park, Hopkins and Golden Valley housewives to gaze upon with barely disguised desire. He also indulges his artistic side by indulging his inner Von Trapp with his family — singing and playing piano with his wife and kids.

    Dave
    Dave Gillette

    Age: 30

    Hometown: Minnetrista, MN

    Political Affiliation: Card carrying member of the press

    The avant-garde creator of a whole new form of video-based illustrated political commentary, Gillette uses his massive drawing muscles for incisive critique while wooing his public with boyish charm and well-developed forearms that would make Olive Oyl swoon in lustful abandon. An avid spectator of politics, Dave combined his passion for illustration with a college-born near-obsession with video documentation that was further fueled by a comedy show he helped create for Channel 45.

    When not offering views sketched out in ink, Gillette is an avid outdoorsman, having just returned from a week in the Boundary Waters. He also just bought a home, allowing hopeful viewers a stable location to maintain their watchful vigil on the artistically tousled commentator.

  • More Fesenjoon. No Sex.

    Back in January, I submitted a blog called Sex and the Fat Man that was about my forthcoming novel in which a large hero has a lot of quality sex and fesenjoon — the dish over which he and the lady with whom he has all that great sex fall in love.

    For the past four months, Sex and the Fat Man has remained in the top 10 most popular daily blogs. NOT, I’m sorry to say, because the world is so breathlessly awaiting my new novel that people are crawling the Web to find information. Nor because the eating public is rife with fesenjoon fanatics who were swooning over my description of the version served at Shiraz Fireroasted Cuisine.

    No, the only reason my blog rates hundreds of hits a day is because it begins with the word "sex." So I want to be totally up front here: there is no sex in my story today. No allusions to sex. No hints of sex. Just fesenjoon.

    I was lunching at Atlas Grill & Clubroom yesterday when Gholam-Abbas Shahbazi, the head chef whom everyone calls simply "Abbas," wandered through. I asked if Abbas would be willing to make me fesenjoon some time. And he said, "It’s on the menu! Only I call it pomegranate-walnut chicken; otherwise, no one would know what it was." It was Americanized, he admitted. But I know Abbas and whatever he makes tends to be good, so I decided to give it a try.

    The meal that arrived was deconstructed fesenjoon. Typically, this dish is like stew made of chopped chicken, pomegranate juice, carmelized onions, crushed walnuts, and citron, served over rice. Here, however, the chicken was two boneless breasts topped with a thick gravy of pomegranate and walnuts. The rice (basmati, perfectly cooked) was mounded to the side and topped with citron. There were vegetables garnishing the plate.

    And it was fabulous.

    Meaty, sweet, plummy with pomegranate sauce and that brickle-ish hint from the salty nuts. Lighter than the standard typically served in the Middle East, the Atlas take on fesenjoon is ideal for lunch. And this was fortunate, because after my dining companion and I had finished, Abbas suddenly appeared with a dish of homemade ice cream.

    I’m not an ice cream eater. First of all, it’s too cold (makes my teeth hurt) and sweet. For me, it’s all about salt, wine, and coffee. But in order to be polite, I took a spoonful and my mouth filled with a difficult but wonderful taste. This was rosewater, saffron, and pistachio — a triangle of red, yellow, and green. And it took full moments to wait out each flavor: the rose so strong it was like a fairytale (then the princess began to sing and rose petals streamed from her lips), the saffron delicate — vanilla with spice — and the pistachios whole and satisfyingly crunchy at the end.

    It wasn’t as good as sex. I’ll give you that. But it was close.

  • Stupid Sex

    Sex is the great equalizer, for does not the rich man
    conduct his doggy-style in much the same way as the poor man? Granted, the rich
    man conducts his to the tune of $5,000 per
    night     while the poor man’s might’ve cost him a bottle of Strawberry Hill at
    the liquor store down the block, but in the end, both situations result in
    guttural noises and a tattered
    web of ego-salving lies    .

    But there’s a dark side to the equalizing power of sex.
    Minnesota may be the 13th smartest state, according to the last
    round of the Smartest State Awards, but once the subtle, nigh ultrasonic
    rustling sound of frilly underwear hitting the floor causes blood to rush south
    to engorge parts unknown and the sheets are stained with fesenjoon,
    we’re every bit as willfully, soul-crushingly stupid as Arizona, #50 on the
    list. As a result, the occurrence of sexually transmitted diseases has risen
    steadily in Minnesota, since as far back as 1996.

    Now, to be fair, it’s quite possible that Minnesotans strip
    down and make like crack-addled bunnies significantly more often than your
    average Arizonan, especially given that our fair state goes for approximately
    six months without seeing sun nor experiencing warmth, so it’s natural for us
    to seek solace and body heat in mind-numbing
    bacchanalia    . But that’s no excuse for a nearly four percent gain in cases
    of syphilis, chlamydia, and gonorrhea in just the last year. And of course,
    that doesn’t include the rampant crabs, trichomoniasis, genital HPV infection
    and other assorted cooties generally associated with icky
    boys    .

    There’s plenty of blame to go around for the fact that
    double bagging it will soon be standard practice when picking up moderately
    attractive drunks     in front of the Lone Tree Bar downtown. We’ll start with
    the modern-day Pandora’s box that is the state government, of course. A paltry
    $1.3 million in state funding was proposed for STD screening and public
    education in the legislature. Of course, in these days of instant
    gratification, the funding was cut. $1.3 million is too much to spend on a
    program that would likely take a few years to return the investment in the form
    of healthier babies, reduced cancer rates, and a dramatic drop in Nietzsche-esque
    insanity and sibling lust     – a condition HMOs are often loathe to cover.
    Plus, think of the horrific janitorial costs as thousands of men shift
    uncomfortably, attempting vainly to hit the urinal whilst their collective
    crotches are on fire.

    There are certainly other reasons for this steady decline in
    pubic health. These include:

    • pediatricians and family doctors
      reluctant to talk with their patients about sexual health for fear
      of finding out just how the lollipops handed out after each visit are
      truly used by oversexed teenagers,
    • abstinence-only
      sex education programs – because preventing kids from learning about how
      to protect themselves in the event they want to bang their way through the
      cheerleading squad/football team/woodwind section of the school orchestra
      seemed like such a good idea at the time

    The
    bottom line is that half of high school seniors and more than 75 percent of
    college students in Minnesota are happily humping their way through their
    academic careers, and many of them think that love is all the antibiotic they
    need. That’s not even mentioning the staggering fact that 25
    percent of girls 14-19     in the U.S. have an STD. A problem with this scope
    may require a bit more than good intentions, a subscription to Penthouse and
    the occasional call to DTMFA from Dan Savage.

    To put an even finer point on it, before he started
    gnawing on the furniture and frothing at the mouth (but after he started
    chasing his sister’s skirt), Mr. Nietzsche said that, "…if a woman seeks
    education, it is probably because her sexual apparatus is malfunctioning."
    Given that we’re inexorably headed toward a day when the entire state
    experiences a burning
    sensation when it pees    , it may be wise to offer the education before the
    girls, or boys, have a chance to request it.

  • Sex and the Fat Man

    I learned again last week that any blog, book, or article with the word "sex" in the title will be read. Not that this was news to me. But it’s a lesson that was reinforced by our nifty Popular Today list, which proved that sex sells better than anything except basketball. Which, when you think about it, is an interesting commentary. . . .

    Now, I don’t know the Lakers from the Bears, but I do know sex. And I even have a legitimate reason to write about sex because my new novel is absolutely chock-full of sex. Really good sex. Only the person who’s having it happens to be an attractive but very, very large man — and I do mean that, in every way.

    So you should know that I spent my entire morning searching for a photo of a sexy fat man for this blog. Finally, I gave up and e-mailed our web guru who spent her entire afternoon searching. And what did we find? Well, what’s above is the best by far.

    I sorted through photos of fat men wearing baseball caps and stuffing enormous hamburgers into their mouths; clinical shots of obese men with pendulous fins of flesh hanging off their 1,000-pound bodies; pictures of sumo wrestlers in diaper-like garb. The closest I could come to a stud with a little meat around the middle was a stock shot of John Goodman, back in the Roseanne years. Yet — and I find this interesting — when I looked for cheesecake photos of hefty women they were in large supply.

    What’s that all about?

    Well, I’ll tell you what it’s all about. We women can talk about weight discrimination until we’re 90 (and probably will): the way men want stick-thin babes on their arms, women who look like heroin-addicted teenage boys and have collarbones that could kill. But suddenly, I’m not at all convinced that the problem isn’t really the other way around.

    Men are out there looking at jpegs of zaftig females lounging on pillows among dozens of cats. They’re getting turned on by women with rounded Rubanesque tummies and thighs that meet. But women, it appears, are not at all interested in looking at photos of beefy, hairy, barrel-stomached men.

    This has become a real hot button issue for me because my book is about a synesthetic 40-year-old food critic [nothing autobiographical there] who begins dating a smart, witty, reliable, thoughtful six-foot-six-inch 300-pound guy. (And no, for all of you who are wondering, my new six-foot-one-inch husband weighs a mere 203 dripping wet. . . .)

    The plot of my novel hinges around the fact that in high-falutin’ foodie circles, fat is simply not acceptable. Oh, the people who attend restaurant openings may talk about food constantly, describing as if it were sex, longingly and with hungry eyes. But they don’t eat much. And they do not care, as a group, for people who do.

    Mind you, I’m exempting real food lovers, most chefs (they eat constantly but they also move constantly,which is how they stay so thin), and those lusty gourmets of the Ruth Reichl type. What I’m talking about here are the socialites who attend every haute cuisine gala in town. When my heroine tries to bring her big man along as escort to one such event, he is openly derided for being not of the right type.

    So the couple ends up instead frequenting a small Persian restaurant in suburban Chicago where he, a scientist, is treated with dignity and she, a food critic, is not even recognized. They fall in love over a dish called fesenjoon, which she describes this way:

    The flavor reminded me of the mood rings we used to have when I was in grade school, with stones that would change color — supposedly depending upon the wearer’s emotional state, but really due to body temperature. Fesenjoon seemed to change in the air: its scent was of one thing and then another. Berries, citrus, bakery buns, roasted chicken, nuts, and earth.

    I wrote this, however, before ever having tasted fesenjoon. I’d read about it. I knew the ingredients (chicken, pomegranate juice, walnuts, onion, and citron), so like a person who can read music and hear the melody in his head, I conjured up the scent and flavor of the dish based upon its recipe.

    Last Friday, my normal-sized husband and I went to Shiraz Fireroasted Cuisine, on 60th and Nicollet, so I could taste the dish around which I’d based the whole crux of my book. Let me tell you, I was nervous. . . .

    "What if I hate it?" I asked my husband in the car.

    "You can write about something else," he said. "Send your editor the changes." He was nice enough, you’ll notice, not to point out that I might have tried fesenjoon before sending the book in.

    Shiraz was, I’m sorry to say, nearly empty. We sat in a booth next to a miniature Persian rug that looked like a little flying carpet. The lights were low and the walls a warm rose color. It would have been a very pleasant place to be except that the noise of clattering dishes coming from the kitchen echoed through the cavelike space.

    We ordered the fesenjoon (called fesenjan at Shiraz) and a ghormeh sabzy stew. Each came with a plate of white rice and lemon zest. I spooned a little of each on my rice and tasted.

    "Do you hate it?" my husband asked.

    I shook my head. But the truth is, I didn’t love it, either. The fesenjan was redder and sweeter than I’d expected, and the Shiraz version seemed to have no onion in it, nothing savory to counter the syrupy pomegranate sauce. The other dish, however, was extraordinary: chunks of rich, tender filet mignon with red beans in a thick gravy made of beef juice, herbs, and lime. It had a nearly South American flavor, mixed with the wondrous plain meaty taste of a rare Manny’s steak.

    Speaking of Manny’s, they have fat men there. Lots of them, and they’re sexy, too. Forget the wifty, silk tie types who hang out at places where the food is vertical, these are guys who take their 4-pound steaks lying down.

    So could someone get over there right now and take a picture. Please?

  • Sex and Duluth

    I’m
    feeling very married these days. More than when I stood in front of the
    judge, more than when I opened a joint checking or co-signed a
    mortgage. And even more than when I drove away from the hospital with
    our first child.

    While my marriage has seen its share of compromise, we’re on the
    brink of its biggest conciliation to date. We’re moving for my
    husband’s career – to Duluth.

    It’s a good opportunity; it really is. But I’ve been so deep in
    mourning I’ve had a hard time hearing all the good reasons. My husband
    had to all but don sock puppets (speaking loudly & slowly) to help
    me to follow the logic of the career potential, the insurance benefits
    (we currently buy our own) and the beauty of moving to a less inflated
    housing market. It’s all good; I know, but we’ll be moving for his great adventure and I’ll be the tag-along – the little woman, the Stepford wife.

    So I’ve been in ostrich mode lately and decided to cope by not. I
    ordered all six seasons of Sex and the City (SATC) from hclib.org and
    have been watching them on my Mac laptop – propped up on the kids’
    bathroom stool – where I can see it while in a hot bath drinking a glass
    of wine. This is a good place to be while waiting for your bed’s
    electric blanket to heat up.

    And while I was deep into my media therapy session watching the
    writer commentary, she said it. Some fancy screenwriter was commenting
    that SATC had to be in New York because it is so alive, so vibrant…and
    because (and I paraphrase here,) “Who would watch a series called Sex
    and Duluth    ?”

    NO SHOUT OUTS TO THE SAD WOMAN IN THE BATHTUB!

    This got me thinking that it’s NOT the time to invite me to a bridal
    shower. I’ve long held the belief that one should be wary of any life
    event that requires a “shower.” Those of us who have done said event,
    like the married women who typically throw these gatherings, can’t
    bring ourselves to tell the bride the cold truth about her future
    institution, so we just buy her a Cuisinart instead.

    I’m afraid if I attended in my present state, I would lose my head
    and leap up and start shaking the bride. “Don’t you know that what this
    party means? One day you could be unexpectedly plucked from the beige
    rambler of your dreams – the one with the open floor plan, first floor
    laundry and solid school district – and cast out of the Cities to a
    place that is the butt of screenwriter jokes!” I’d then have to
    straighten myself up, smooth out the bride and excuse myself to the
    restroom where I’d climb out the window.

    Of course, it is not like I’m leaving the Twin Cities forever. I’ll
    be back for overnights probably twice a month to retain some writing
    clients here and stay with my fabulous mother-in-law.

    And there are moments, when I’m clear-eyed and possess a willing
    spirit, when I can actually see where my husband is coming from. It
    really is a great opportunity for our family and Duluth does have a
    tempting lifestyle. But I’m not putting everything I own into a truck
    for job or a big lake. I’m doing it because I love my husband and want
    to support him in his career as he has supported me in mine. Because
    you see, I’m married.

  • Better Than An Italian Supermodel

    So how was JesusChristmas for you all here in the United States? I have been away over the holidays but I have not been wasting time.

    Au contraire.

    You see I have been busily working in France test driving cars that most people can only dream about. Cars even hotter than France’s new President’s bride to be (a former supermodel, shamelessly so). I’ve included a shot of the F40 I picked up in front of the Ritz on the Place Vendome’. This is the Ferrari that everyone wants due to its umitigated brutality (the last full car designed by the Holy Devil himself.)

    My photos are taking too long to upload at present but a Veyron is in here as well as a Gullwing and some more classic Bugattis, Alfas and Porsches.

    Who needs women, nez pas?

    (That’s what Nicholas has been known to say.) 

  • Can You Eat Your Way to Better Sex?

    So. I was at the Jewish Community Center on Christmas Day — along with what appeared to be every other fitness-minded non-Christian in the western metro — on the elliptical trainer, reading Self magazine, when I ran across an article entitled The Great Sex Diet. And out of a deep sense of professional responsibility, I read.

    This was no small task. It was a very lengthy treatise that included not only food advice, but a list of "myths" about aphrodisiacs, the testimony of a sex expert, and (oddly, I thought) the intensely personal thoughts of the author — an online novelist (?) named Valerie Frankel — who had tried all the recommended techniques with her husband, as well as a blow-by-blow account of exactly how each one worked out.

    Unlike most magazine articles, however, this one failed to provide any useful, scannable information in the form of a handy-dandy bullet-pointed list. Rather, the advice was buried in and amongst details none of us needs to know. So in order to save you the pain and embarrassment of reading the entire article for yourself, I’m going to do here what I think the editor at Self should have done for her readership.

    If you want to have better sex, try eating:

    Almonds and Walnuts — they’re high in arginine, an amino acid the body uses to make nitric oxide, which in turn opens blood vessels and allows them to expand

    Salmon, Cod and Halibut — also contain arginine, plus omega-3 fatty acids, which may increase both libido and orgasmic intensity

    Spinach, Broccoli, Beets, Berries, and Grapes — because they’re high in antioxidants which clean up free radicals and improve general cell health

    Dark Chocolate — also a great source of antioxidants, plus endorphin-raising compounds that enhance circulation

    In other words, the very same foods (jeepers!) you should eat to ensure peak cardiovascular function, prevent premature aging, maintain a healthy weight, and build strong hair, bones, fingernails, and teeth. Hmmm. . . .Could it be that healthy living actually leads to better sex? Wow!!! Who in the world could have predicted that?

    Apparently not Frankel, who went on (the diet portion was only the first third of the article) to talk about all the fancy supplements she took to increase her level of free testosterone, her always "reliable" clitoris and inadequate G-spot, as well as her use of a device called a GyneFlex that sounded kind of like a Thighmaster for the vagina.

    Believe me, you’re better off not reading the entire article, in which Frankel talked glibly about giving up cigarettes temporarily in order to improve her circulation so she could orgasm more easily (never mind breathe. . . .) And then she went way, way too far, suggesting that those in search of good sex should give up coffee and alcohol, too. As if being perpetually cranky, tired, and stone cold sober ever did anything for anyone’s love life.

    Anyhow, culling the two or three paragraphs of useful information from this mess of personal memoir and genital workout routine, I think the message can be distilled down to this:

    On your next date night, go out (or stay in), relax, have a glass of red wine; a spinach salad with walnuts and a nice balsamic vinaigrette; a piece of grilled fish; and for dessert, a few squares of 70-80 percent cacao dark chocolate. Then feel free to finish it all off with a good, strong cup of espresso.

    This is me talking now and I say go for it, caffeine be damned. Because God willing, you’re going to be up until dawn.

  • Love That Latex!

    So, maybe by now you have seen Lars and the Real Girl. It’s a comedy set in Minnesota and the title character, Lars Lindstrom, is the sort of Norwegian bachelor Garrison Keillor never mentions. You see, Lars is a social misfit who sends away for an anatomically correct sex doll, falls in love with it, and begins bringing it along on visits to relatives and out to dinner. According to gossip, the actor playing Lars—Ryan Gosling—became so enamored of his costar that he bought her and brought her home, much to the discomfort of his flesh-and-blood girlfriend, Rachel McAdams.

    It’s the ultimate mail-order bride, but of course sex dolls are nothing new. Back when I was a sweet young thing on the comedy circuit, I spent a lot of time in L.A. with a famous big-shot agent who was trying to make me the next Roseanne. Aggressive as he was—he’s actually the guy Jeremy Piven’s character in Entourage is based on—he couldn’t turn me into the next Rose Marie. But we spent a lot of time together, and he would dazzle me with tales of his clients’ eccentricities. According to him, one of America’s favorite funnymen had a thing for elaborately detailed $6,000 love dolls. Actual Austin Powers-style Fembots made of flesh-like sculpted silicone. I guess the real women in his life weren’t cold, fake, and submissive enough.

    I’m pretty sure there’s a message here about the objectification of women in our culture, but I can’t get too indignant. The way I look at it:

    A) That’s $6,000 the guy won’t be spending on roofies;

    B) This is taking exactly the right kind of people out of the breeding pool; and

    C) I have considered buying the economy blow-up doll version so I could use the carpool lanes.

    So who am I to judge? Fact is, I did once have my own boyfriend doll, Armando. I purchased him for a bit that I used to do onstage, then I ended up taking him to parties as my date. This was a period in my life when dating a fella who would dress how he was told and listen to me for as long as I wanted was pretty appealing. I was up to the challenge of interacting with actual human men, but there were advantages to snuggling up to a guy-shaped balloon. For one thing, he wasn’t afraid of my single-mother status. And a partner you can store in the back of the closet was quite practical in the cramped apartment where I lived.
    Eeeew, you’re saying. How could you cuddle with something that just lies there like a lox: clammy, slightly squishy, and unresponsive? Hey, I’ve had girlfriends who married that guy. My problems stemmed from me being the jealous type. I was worried I would come home early and catch him with a female mannequin AWOL from Nordstrom, the two going at it like the marionettes in Team America: World Police. After a trauma like that you’d probably be incapable of having a relationship with another doll.

    It was fear of embarrassment that pushed me back to dating guys with a pulse. I couldn’t imagine wandering the streets after a torrid wrestling match, looking for an all-night bike repair shop that stocks flesh-colored tire repair patches. Or what about bringing him home to meet the folks? Mom would give him a big hug, making him blow a huge raspberry and sending him whizzing around the room a couple times, only to collapse in a wrinkled heap.

    In all likelihood, guys are psychologically better equipped to have a long-term, meaningful, and committed relationship with a latex lady. Guys love stuff. They love their cars. They love their computers. They love their boats. And they could love us, too, if we were just better engineered.

    My hope would be that owning one of these dolls is a gateway for a guy to have a relationship with a lady who is warmer than room temperature—the same kind of imaginative outlet I had when my Barbie was living in sin with Ken. Looking after a love doll does require a certain degree of commitment on the guy’s part. She is harder to clean than an old gym sock; you probably need a bottle brush. And lugging Silicone Sally to the dinner table and waltzing her around the ballroom before retiring to the boudoir takes a lot of effort. These things weigh 130 pounds, which makes them only two percent more plastic by body weight than Cher.

    So I will not wag the finger of disapproval from my comfy chair of judgment. We often try to mold our partners like putty. Is it really such a reach to send for one that was vacuum-molded by Mattel instead?

  • Food and Sex. . . Hungry?

    There’s nothing new about the link between great food and sultry sex. It’s been around since the era of the ancient Romans, then flagged during repressive periods such as the Dark Ages and the 1950’s, but went through a glorious renaissance right around the time I was born.

    Gael Greene, an outrageous and perversely reed-thin journalist began writing about food for New York Magazine in 1968 and subsequently launched the so-called "forkplay" genre. Her novel Blue Skies, No Candy, was like Erica Jong meets Julia Child — one big orgy, slippery with sauces and peaks of whipped cream. Body secretions and wine; kissing, tasting, and swallowing. Sating every hunger, those located in one’s stomach and those located between the legs.

    Now in her late 60’s, Greene is still writing. Last year, her memoir Insatiable came out, in which she detailed (and I do mean detailed) her sexual encounters with Elvis Presley, Clint Eastwood, the chef at Le Cirque in 1977, and a porn star named Jamie Gillis. In an endearingly sharp turn from haute cuisine and personal erotica, Greene also founded Citymeals-on-Wheels, a charity organization that
    delivers more than two million free meals a year to New York City’s elderly
    shut-ins.

    Now, I’m no Gael Greene (for which my husband is thankful). But I recently wrote a novel about the life of an "accidental" food critic, sent it off to my agent, and received his feedback this week. Great sex, he said. I want more. The food’s important but that can slip into the background. All that hot, post-dinner lovemaking, that’s what we want. White Bordeaux, the sticky steaming meat of braised artichoke hearts, sandwiches of salty little capers with smoked salmon and lemon mayonnaise. Then to bed: taut naked skin, slick contact, whispered words and hard effort, the scents of garlic, wine, and dark chocolate still wafting through the room.

    I’m working on all that.

    Meantime, right here in Minneapolis, there’s a new generation of Greene-style food writers, including Alexis McKinnis who writes a sex column for vita.mn and an about-town foodie blog called Girl Friday. She’s been featured on Kare 11 and elsewhere, but the focus has been entirely — or so it’s seemed to me — on the salacious aspects of her life. And she’s been portrayed as some brand-new species of food writer, rather than someone who’s following in the tradition (fairly well, I might add — McKinnis’s blog is always current and well-written) of food-and-sex journalists from nearly 40 years ago.

    Others are simply trashy, a mess of string bikini odes, scatalogical tales, and gluttony. What Greene understood, and I think McKinnis does, too, is that there’s a delicate balance between sex and food. You have to deliver a vicarious thrill, then back off and leave just a touch to the reader’s imagination. . . .or experience.